CHAPTER X.
Theywere strolling together in the art gallery. It was the first time that Glenn had seen Esther since returning from his vacation. He stopped to admire a picture, for the second time, pointing out its beauties for her. She appreciated his interpretations, and her acute understanding grew more beautiful to him.
“I never look at such work,” he said, “without wondering what it cost its creator. The gift of art is great, sacred, yet it is one long term of self-denial.”
“I know that,” Esther assented. She was beginning to realize its draining demands. She had brightened a trifle to-day in spite of it. A little of the old impulsive blooming beauty hadcome back. The brisk walk through the park, in the keen, sweet autumn weather might have heightened that—and Glenn’s return doubtless had something to do with it.
“Mrs. Low has a picture in her gallery by this same artist. She has one of the finest private galleries in the city. You shall see it, I believe, now that she’s back. I promised her I’d bring you to one of her receptions. She’s noted for having people who are amazingly clever, or beautiful or something of the sort. Fortunately I come under the class, ‘Should auld acquaintance be forgot?’ But you are to do your turn. She expects it. We will go next Tuesday to her opening night. You will see a live lord. Her daughter, who married one, brought him home with her.”
“Will it make me like you any less?”
“I should hope not. Rather more, for he has brutal manners, and you would never think she held a higher place than his stenographer. But she doesn’t mind that, she has a title. He drawshis allowance from her and his inspiration from elsewhere. I fancy they are rather contented.”
“Contented!” Esther lifted a solemn face to him.
“It seems to me that a marriage without love would crush all that was sweetest and finest in a woman’s nature. Marriage for love is the dearest gift to any soul—it is the highest ideal of God’s world.” She was in one of her intense moods.
“But if it be for anything else?” He encouraged her to go on.
“It’s a desecration. Love is not only the holiest thing in the life of a woman, but it’s life itself for the man. It makes him whatever he becomes. The righteous altar-vow is a delight and to obey is the cry of the heart if it speaks the words with the lips.”
“You know we never agreed upon that subject. I consider marriage merely an incident in life.”
“But the one decisive incident of it all,” she returned.
They had left the gallery and were going through the park. His glance wandered often from her face to a glad contemplation of the vivid coloring of the woods.
“Mightn’t a man marry for honor?” finally he asked.
“Give me an example.”
“I am not trying to convert you,” he said, disclaiming all responsibility.
“Tell me of a case?”
His face contracted nervously. “Let’s talk about something else.”
With a little impatient gesture, “Oh, give me an instance, it will keep me from imagining things.” She stopped by a rustic seat with an independent lift of the head and would go no further. She felt that she deserved his confidence and trust. Upon her face were tears of pained emotion. She did not know herreal place in his life and whenever she struggled for it her suffering was intense.
There was a pause. Glenn decided to humor her. Taking a seat beside her, he began in his tone of tranquil philosophy:
“Suppose a man—young—under an infatuation, becomes engaged to a girl. When he is older, his ideas change; he gets over it, she doesn’t. Although he has a sincere regard and respect for her, in his heart there is another ideal. He regrets being bound. What should he do?”
“I hate the word ‘bound.’ Marriage is not to bind, but to privilege. Without love it would be nothing more than slavery. Every human soul revolts at that.”
“But an engagement is like a gambling debt; it has no witnesses. It puts a man upon his honor.”
“Might he not have the nobility to assume his vows, without the fortitude to endure them manfully? That would make each think nothing of love and little of life. I believe it is impossible for a man to be true to his wife with anotherwoman’s image in his heart; in spite of outward appearances the emptiness is there—convention cannot crush out nature. If he took a vow like that, he’d be false to it; hypocracy is dishonor.” She suddenly fronted him.
“What would you do if you were the man?”
“Oh, don’t make an example of me,” he said in a hard voice. “You know me well enough to guess what I would do.”
She turned her eyes to his face; her expression changed. “You would be true to what you thought was your honor.”
“I hope I would fulfill any promise I should make.” He had always had himself in command, yet he was sometimes conscious of a fear that Esther might have dreamed some touch of heroism in his nature, which was not there. Her ideal of him had been impressed upon her immaturity.
“I have a story about a man’s honor,” she said after an awkward silence, lifting a small paper volume in her hand. “The young man on myfloor asked me to take it and read it. He said it was ‘simply great.’”
“‘Simply great,’ was it?” Glenn said, taking the book. “Certainly he is bold and unconventional enough to presume to offer you a book when you have scarcely a speaking acquaintance with him.”
“He brought it to my door one rainy day; I took it as a kindness.” Reading the French title, Glenn’s eyes took on the glint of steel.
“Have you read it?” he asked.
“No, I thought we might begin it together to-day.”
“Well, we won’t,” he told her, frankly. “It is not the kind for you to read. When the young man inquires for his book you can send him to me.”
Glenn was never more savagely angry as he doubled the book and thrust it into his pocket. He would keep from her that part of the world’s evil at least.
“Have I done anything you don’t like?”
“No, but it maddens me to see anybody try to impose upon you. Don’t accept any more courtesies from that class; I’ll bring you all the books that you want to read.”
“You are very good; I’ll try to remember that,” she promised. He hoped she would. His care of her was like the fond tending of a flower that has been unwittingly left in a fetid atmosphere.